Reel Critics

Ray Buffer

What if Simon Wells (H.G. Wells’ great grandson and director of The

Time Machine) could go back in time and decline directing this film. What

if. What if.

The film opens well with a beautiful aerial shot of 1890’s suburbia.

The period sequence is well done, but from there on (with the exception

of two skimmed-over references to time paradoxes) the film devolves and

loses its audience to tedium.

Guy Pierce plays the Time Traveler, Doctor of Science - Alexander

Hartdegen. The good doctor, who is a wimp when protecting his fiancee of

10 seconds from a plump British mugger in the late 19th century, is suddenly a swashbuckling adventurer in the year 802,700 as he battles

10-foot tall, 700 pound, sensationally muscular Morlocks. Naaaah, there’s

no inconsistency here.

One probably can not blame Pierce for his disjointed performance since

screenwriter John Logan (“Gladiator” scribe and writer of the upcoming

“Star Trek: Nemesis”) probably deserves that credit. For somewhat comical

relief, Orlando Jones plays an omniscient, holographic,

computer-generated librarian whom we are to believe: a.) exists 28 years

from now in the year 2030, and b.) survives close to a million years to

help out Hartdegan later in the story.

Jones is fine in the role he is given, but the role -- a creation not

in H.G.’s original story -- makes no logical sense.

I must admit I had high hopes for this remake of the science fiction

classic. Many liberties were taken with the original story such as giving

the time traveler a name and a history and giving him a girlfriend who

meets with tragedy that motivates him to construct the Time Machine in

order to try and change the past.

What we are left with is a hodgepodge plot that does not seem to know

where it is going. Once we arrive at “the meat” of the original story

(the part with the Eloi and Morlocks) it is as if the producers came in

with their stopwatch and said “Hey! You’ve used up an hour and a half,

now wrap up the rest of this story in two explosive minutes.” As bad as

the film is, it really needed to be longer in order for the story line to

develop more logically.

The original 1960 film had overtones of communism and allusions to the

cold war. This film has nothing but bluster and confusion at its core.

When the film ends, instead of feeling energized and stimulated, you

feel empty and betrayed.

* RAY BUFFER, 31, is a professional singer, actor and voice-over

artist.